Democratic Republic of the Congo

The Democratic Republic of the Congo is one of the largest states in Africa. The country has many natural resources, but it presents some of the lowest development indices in the world. Since Congo's independence in 1960, its history has been marked by several civil wars.

Between 1998 and 2003, one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world, known as the "African World War", broke out and resulted in the displacement of a large part of the Congolese population. Today, the situation is not stable, especially in the East of the country, where insecurity dominates.

AVSI intervenes in situations of chronical crises, together with local communities. Their initiatives aim at reducing the consequences of these crises, working on health, education and to increase families’ income. AVSI’s activities include the support to families and women, the protection of children, quality primary and secondary education, and the strengthening of civil society organizations.

The focus of AVSI's work in DR Congo is answering to the needs of thousands of displaced people who continue to move from one place to another, without a destination because of the continuous fighting. AVSI protects the children, their families and the communities against discriminations, violence and exploitation, ensuring immediate access to primary services, like quality education or by distributing essential items and through cash transfer projects.

This tool transfers cash without imposing any condition on the beneficiaries. The idea is that they know better than anyone how to meet their own needs.

AVSI implements several educational projects: renovating and reconstructing schools, distributing school supplies and teaching aids and facilitating teacher training. AVSI’s psycho-social module, tested and used in these projects, is considered by UNICEF as best practice for its effectiveness.

Another sector in which AVSI has a long experience is that of food security and the fight against malnutrition. It supports nutritional centres, helps in the organization of educational sessions for the sanitary personnel, works in the villages to identify cases of malnutrition and it supplies therapeutic food.

Through education, AVSI promotes strategies to protect children’s rights. Among the activities: the creation of community committees for the protection of children (RECOPE, Réseau Communautaire Protection Enfant), informative sessions to raise awareness, identification of the cases of rights’ violations.

AVSI implements projects for the use of cleaner, more reliable, economically and environmentally sustainable cooking technologies focusing on increasing awareness, affordability and accessibility of improved cooking stoves to the most vulnerable households.

In the field of solar energy, it creates off-grid solar systems to ensure access to reliable sources of electricity by fostering economic and social growth in the most disadvantaged communities.